Women's land rights are of special concern in Rwanda where most agricultural activities, including both

cultivation and marketing, are conducted by women and where 33.9% of households are female-headed

(2005 RDHS-III). Women's rights to land are precarious and complicated by such customary practices as

land management and ownership, the predominance of informal marriages or consensual unions, and

polygamy. Despite a relatively progressive inheritance law, patrilineal inheritance patterns continue in

Rwanda. These practices, in conjunction with the acute land shortage, translate to fewer land parcels

passing to women. Women who do have access to land through their household sometimes lose their

access to that land in the event of the breakdown of the household (by way of widowhood, abuse,

abandonment, banishment, and polygamy). When women lose their access and rights to land, these

women frequently are forced to turn to higher-risk behaviors that may increase the incidence of HIV/AIDS.

According to the 2005 RDHS-III, 33.2% of widowed women reported being dispossessed of property.

Rwanda's 2003 Constitution, recent Land Policy, 2005 Organic Land Law, and Inheritance Law all promote

and establish land-related legal rights for women and prohibit gender discrimination. However, the

difficulties and challenges inherent in clarifying and implementing any law, along with the cultural and

informal realities that govern gender relations in Rwanda, make it a challenge to achieve the goals set out in

the Constitution and underlying laws.

The EP will provide support to this USAID-funded land reform activity to include a short-term technical

specialist on gender and land to incorporate gender-specific provisions within the new land laws, decrees,

and regulations. That person will also help to amend existing laws to: reflect and attempt to accommodate

the slowly changing reality of customary and informal practices; improve the likelihood that women can

retain land when household events occur (such as HIV-infection or death due to AIDS) that might otherwise

divest them of their land; provide for more universal land titling to women, including those living in informal

consensual unions; and better provide for women to obtain land by way of market transactions. Taken

together, this assistance will improve women's ability to access and retain needed productive land

resources and viable sources of livelihoods, and to lower the need to engage in high-risk behavior as a

survival strategy. One significant outcome should be the prevention of high-risk behavior and, by extension,

it should reduce the incidence of HIV infection among Rwandans.

The direct output of this activity is to facilitate the passage of legislation that would advance gender equity

for PLHIV.

This activity addresses the key legislative issue of gender. This activity advances the Rwanda EP five-year

strategy by improving the quality of life for all PLHIV, especially HIV+ women.